Dragon Born
by shawnrbliss
Summary: You are sent on a dangerous quest, but you get more than you bargain for...


You lay silently on your stomach in the tall weeds of grass, arms bent out in front of you. Your right hand firmly grasps the elfish longbow while your left hand digs itself into the cool soil of the earth. Beside your right side is a sleek ebony blade and on your left is a heavy dwarven shield. You shift your body slightly, moving the quiver on your back and the orcish dagger around your waist. Your breathing is slow, making as little sound as you can. The vast plain is quiet and peaceful. The sky is clear of clouds, allowing an ocean of blue to spread cleanly. Suddenly, you hear a disturbance through the brush you placed yourself in. Through the weeds, a four legged, black, furry creature stands only ten yards away from you. It's soon accompanied with two, no, three more. You can hear them sniffing and then snarl. _Wolves_. You press yourself as low as you can to the ground, hoping they won't notice your scent. But to doubt their acute nose is foolish. All three of their heads jerked towards the brush you lay in. They start to growl slightly, baring their teeth. No longer hoping for their passing, you have to act. Pushing yourself up into a kneeling position, your left hand reaches back, grasping one of the many arrow's feather from your quiver. The arrows were elven, made by a powerful and beautiful elfish woman. In one smooth fluid motion, your bring it out, notch the arrow into the bowstring, drawing it back, and taking in a deep breath. Your movements are so fast and efficient; the wolves are still processing the sight of you. Your eyes naturally align the arrow to the wolf that was nearest you. Slowly releasing your breath, your fingers extend straight out and the bowstring snaps forward, releasing the arrow. The arrow hit its mark with a sickening thud, piercing through the wolf's skull. It immediately dropped and went limp. The other three came sprinting towards you, closing the distance quickly. Dropping your bow and grabbing the ebony blade to your right, you swing the sword upwards, catching the bottom of the first attacking wolf's jaw. It cuts cleaning through the jaw through its right eye. The other two come at you simultaneously from either side. Your hand swiftly reaches for the dagger around your waist, side stepping the wolf on your right as it lunges. Just as you evade that one, the other one lunges. While jabbing your ebony blade into its side, the dagger's blade is brought down upon its head. Twisting around while tearing the dagger from the dagger that was lodged into the wolf's head, you face the last attacker. The dagger leaves your hand as it twirls through the air, driving itself deep into the leg of the wolf. It whimpers as it stumbles back. It tries to retreat away, but you stride to its side, raising the ebony blade above your head. You bring the blade down upon its head, decapitating it.

You wait patiently in the brush, resuming your original position after cleaning up the mess with the wolves. The sun is slowly falling towards the horizon as the day continues into late noon. The air starts to cool and a slight breeze passes through. A herd of deer came moving into the area, stopping to graze. You relax as you watch them, wondering why they chose to stop here. The area seemed to be calm, though it was known to be chaotic, according to a village eleven miles from here. That's why you're here in the first place, to end the chaos that is associated with this place. But there was nothing here, only a pack of wolves that were easily disposed of. Maybe the stories that the villagers told were a myth, maybe they were-

The deer rose from the grass, freezing like statues. Only their ears swiveled back and forth. They were hearing something, something that was setting them on edge. In a few seconds, you hear it, the sound of wind moving in rhythmic beats. The sound rolled down from the mountains that were on the horizon of the plains just east of you. The beats increased in noise, eventually scaring away the herd of deer. Your breath quickens and you wait. The source of the noise was so close that it was filling your ears. A large shadow passes over the plain and then over you. Ever so slowly, you gaze up. A large scaly creature circles high in the skies, its wings spanning across the plain so much that it blocks out the sun in the surrounding area. Its mouth opened and a deafening roar riveted from its throat. _Dragon._ Your mind was exploding with excitement, fear, and curiosity. It wasn't a myth, this thing in front of you, was real. A ferocious creature that is the very remnant of an ancient history only few knew about but never spoke of. It was the embodiment of the very horror and danger that the stories told to children would pursue. This was your task, to kill the dragon that was terrorizing this area. Chosen due to the skill and training you had, the strength you showed, and the calmness you held, everyone in this world deemed it necessary that you could kill it. Standing up proudly, you remove an elfish arrow from your quiver and prepare your bow. Pulling back the string, you follow the dragon's circling with the tip of the arrowhead. Predicting the pattern of its movement, you let the arrow fly. It races towards its target with incredible speed and force. The arrow disappears in the sky, but a few seconds pass before the dragon roars again. This time, it's shaky and the duration of it is longer. Its wings folds close to its side and it plummets down to the ground. Just before reaching the earth, it flares its wings out, decelerating its fall drastically. The ground rumbles as its feet touches the ground. Its long neck stretches out towards you and its massive head moves in front of you. You now see the incredible power of it; the burning hatred and anger in its luminous eyes, the sandy scaled armor that covers its body, and the full size of its presence. You are a mere size of its head. Fear crawls into your mind and the hair on your body stand on end. Images of you being torn into by its teeth that are as sharp as a daedric dagger, the blood that will be pouring out of your body as you are snapped in half within its jaws flashes through your mind. Do you run or do you fight? No time to react as it rears back and springs it neck forward, the mouth of the beast approaching fast. Your mind blanks, but your body reacts out of instinct. With a simple powerful roll back, the attack is avoided. Your hands grasp the shield and blade from the ground as you get in the defense stance, shield raised in front of you and the blade's tip pointed forward. The dragon advances, using its tail first as a powerful whip. You use your shield to parry the attack while swinging your sword around, striking the dragon's side, but it didn't break the scales armor. Ducking, the dragon's mouth misses your head allowing you to land an upward thrust of the blade into the bottom of its jaw. The power you put behind the blade just broke the scales and the ebony blade bit into the dragon's flesh. Its head jerks back, tearing away from the blade as it lets out a ferocious roar. The eyes now burn with a fiery vengefulness. Its head rears back, its mouth open to the skies and you see a bright orange glow forming from its neck, traveling to the base of its mouth. The dragon's head snaps forward and a blast of spiraling fire spewed towards you. You crouch down and use your shield to protect you from the dragon's fire breath. You can feel your skin start to itch as the heat from the fire takes the moisture away. The shield may be blocking the fire, but you can feel that the heat around you would soon cause you to combust. Pushing the shield forward, taking the fire full on, you charge at the head of the dragon. Your shield bashes into the mouth of the dragon, startling it which ceases its fire onslaught. Seeing your opportunity, you drop your shield, while grasping the ebony blade with both hands, and swinging it with all your might at the head. The dragon screeches in pain as the blade sinks itself into the side of the dragon's head, cutting through the bone. The sword finally gets caught deep within the dragon's skull, clearing into the brain. The dragon's loud screech ends abruptly and slumps to the ground. Breathing heavily, you fall back to the ground, staring at your success. The dragon is dead; your sword is lodged into its head as proof of your victory. Closing your eyes, you can just hear the people in the village shouting your name in praise. You'll be rich, famous, they will sing songs about you, and they'll call you the immortal, the dragon slayer. A smile spreads across your lips as you can taste the feast they will have in your name. Suddenly, the ground rumbles beneath you as thunder cracks the air. But there was another sound, the sound of the earth shattering beneath large amounts of weight fills your ears. Your eyes burst open to find five very live dragons surrounding you and the dead carcass. Fear once again takes your mind, but also your soul. Where did they come from? They just all appeared. Your eyes darts between all of them to find out they are larger and their scales are of a crimson shade, one that could be most associated to blood. A large spiral of dragon fire seeped out of the ground between you and the dead dragon corpse. The skies turned black and the fire evaporated into the air and in its place was a cloaked figure with a snarling dragonbone mask. Its robes were ash black and raggedy, its hands were covered with spiky dragonbone gauntlets, and its feet were pointed with dragonbone boots. You could feel breath growing irregular, sweat starting to bead above your eyebrows, and your muscles twitching violently. The aura this figure was giving off was cold and terrifying. Your voice catches in your throat as you managed to stutter, "W-Who ar-are you?" The figure takes a step forward towards you, towering over you, making you realize he was taller than the average person. A dark and low voice vibrated the air as it slowly spoke. "I.. I am the Dragon Born; the legendary master over all dragons." Your mind races as you connect what he said to what you know. The Dragon Born was a chosen person or creature that was able to control the dragons to do their biddings. The last Dragon Born started a war in which he sought to end the world in fire. Supposedly, all the races in this world aligned together to banish the Dragon Born to Oblivion. The figure took a pause, taking in a deep breath as it looked around at its surroundings. "I have returned to finish the war I started so long ago." Its face turns back towards you and although you can't see its eyes, you could feel its cold gaze gripping and tormenting your soul. "Now.. Burn." The surrounding dragons reared back, their mouths open to the sky, the bright orange glow forming from their throat and traveling to their mouths. You can't move, you can't even scream. Your soul feels like its being held in its place by icy cold claws that's stealing your freewill away. All you can do is stare helplessly as the dragons' heads snap forward and the fire emitted from their mouth. The last sight you see is the flames rising up, incinerating your body and the figure of the Dragon Born in front of you.


End file.
